Dear Different Dimension Diary
by Epikoinos
Summary: In an alternate timeline Amy writes in her diary about the evening she went to Shane Harvey's party with Karma and Lauren. Written for Yuletide.


Dear Diary,

My plans for a lazy Saturday night at home this evening were shattered by Lauren stomping into my bedroom at half past eight. Lauren is my very dearest (i.e. _only_) step sister-to-be. She's the daughter of Bruce, my mom's (latest) fiancé. And now she lives with us! At least I didn't have to move to Dallas. Mom and Bruce decided that mom's job was more important than his, so he and Lauren had to move here instead. Yay feminism! .

My name is Amy Raudenfeld, by the way. I'm blonde, I have green eyes, I'll soon be 16 and I don't know why I bother writing these descriptions every fucking time I write something new here. It's not like anyone's gonna read my diary anyway. And if they do they'll have read all the other descriptions I've written before in other "stories" so yeah. Moving on.

"Are you coming or what?" Lauren said from the doorway. She was wearing a black dress with… some kind of white square pattern? I dunno. I think she'd even _starched_ it. Dear god. If she didn't hate my mother they'd be best friends.

_I_, on the other hand, was wearing sweatpants and a t-shirt with holes in it. I'm fashionable like that. I also had no idea what Lauren was doing in my room. Usually we stay out of each other's way as much as you can when the person you're avoiding lives in the room opposite yours. Yeah, fuck my life and so on. Let's get back to the story.

"What." I said. The '.' At the end is important. It makes it into a flat what, which conveys disdain instead of confusion. Huge difference.

"I said 'Are you coming or what?'" Lauren replied, as if explaining something to a child. Bitch.

I rolled my eyes at her.

"I heard you," I said. "But you're not making sense. Coming where?"

At that she actually _stepped into my room_and _sat down on my bed_. (After carefully brushing off my bedcovers. Bitch.)

"I overheard you and your bosom buddy talking today," she whispered all conspiratorially, leaning towards me. I could smell her perfume. (It was sickly sweet. I was not surprised.)

"Yeah, I know," I replied. "And then you called us lesbians. Very classy."

Lauren made that ugly little face twitch that always make me want to choke her.

"Whatever," she said. "Your friend said she wanted an invitation to Shane Harvey's party. So I'm inviting her. And you. Right now."

"Er, wha- uh. Um. Huh…" I said. Or something like that. Lauren's line was just so completely out of the blue.

When I 'found my voice' again I said "Well. I'm sorry, but last time I checked your name was _not_Shane Harvey. You can't invite people to _someone else's_ party, you know."

"Well, technically I guess I'm inviting you to _crash_his party, then, Miss Nitpick. Now, I'm only gonna say this one more time: Are you coming or what?"

"_Why_would I want to crash Shane Harvey's party with you when I can stay at home and watch yoyo-routines on Youtube?" I said. It seemed like the obvious question to ask.

"Well, _I_should have been invited, obviously, but I wasn't, so I can't just show up like nothing's wrong. I need to make a statement, and for that I need a _posse_. I have Tommy, of course, but Leila and Lisbeth couldn't come. Church something, I think… I didn't listen."

"…isn't her name Elizabeth?" I interrupted, but Lauren didn't listen to me either.

"Anyway," she said. "That's where you and organic juice girl come in. I need you two to back me up. So just call her, put on something presentable and _let's go_."

* * *

><p>I obviously had to call Karma. Karma is the "bosom buddy" Lauren was talking about, if that wasn't clear. She's my best friend. But if you're reading my diary you already know that. Short version: I met Karma Ashcroft in a ball pit when we were in kindergarten, we hit it off immediately, yadda yadda… (Her parents make organic juices that they sell out of a van, if you were wondering about Lauren's "organic juice girl" quip.)<p>

Karma loves zany schemes, and I knew how much she wanted to go to the party. For some reason Karma likes consorting with the plebs. And _I_can't stand disappointing her. I mean, yesterday I went along with her pretending to be blind for chrissakes! She's my soppy spot. Ew, that sounded disgusting. What I mean is: I'm not a soppy person, but when it comes to her I sorta am? Anyway. I called her.

She picked up before the end of the first ring.

"Hi Amy!" she said in a save-me-from-my-utter-boredom tone of voice. "Wanna come over and help me finish the comfort candy I bought for not being at Shane Harvey's party? I know movie night was yesterday, but we _could_watch another documentary about child labor in East Asia. Or House Hunters!"

"Actually, I have a better… or, well, at least _another_idea," I replied. "Lauren's crashing Shane's party, and for some inexplicable reason she wants us to join her. You up for it?"

"What?" (Karma hasn't perfected her flat what yet. We're working on it.)

"Yeah, I know, shit's weird, but it's our one chance of getting to go. And you have to agree that crashing a party has a pretty good chance of getting us noticed."

"Hm," Karma sounded thoughtful. "Maybe not the best kind of attention, but beggars can't be choosers. Sign me up!"

There was a silence for a moment as I counted down to…

"Wait! What am I gonna wear?"

* * *

><p>I'm sure Karma found the time to go through all of her wardrobe before Tommy picked her up. (In the end she chose this lacy white dress that makes her look sexy and innocent at the same time, I don't know how she does it.) Me, I just put on my cleanest jeans overall over my t-shirt. It's great, because it hides the big hole on the front of said t-shirt.<p>

Lauren stood outside my room as I changed, tapping her foot. As soon as I was done she grabbed my arm and dragged me down the stairs.

"Bye, Ms Raudenfeld. Amy and I are going out!" she yelled into the kitchen as we hurried past.

Mom came rushing out of the kitchen when she heard Lauren's voice.

"Going out? Together?" she said. "Oh, that's _nice_. Have fun girls!"

She waved us out with a huge grin on her face. It made my heart break a little. She just wants us to get along and be "sisters" _so much_.

And then I saw Lauren roll her eyes her. Bitch. Rolling her eyes at my mom is a privilege she has _not_ earned.

* * *

><p>We arrived at the party about an hour after it started. The host himself, Shane Harvey, greeted us at the door after some insistent knocking from Lauren. He was wearing a blue shirt with a large flower print. You have to give it to him, he doesn't hide who he is one bit.<p>

"I don't remember inviting you, Lauren," he said with his big, goofy smile.

"You should be thanking us for being here," Lauren replied. She was _not_smiling. "Tommy and I are the front-runners for Homecoming King and Queen. People expect us to make an appearance." Her voice was so bossy that it almost made what she said sound reasonable.

Before Shane had time to reply I put on my very best disdainful sneer, pointed to me and Karma, and said "And we two here are her _posse_."

Getting to say that was worth the pain of Lauren's elbow in my ribs.

Shane's face shone up like a sun.

"Oh my god what? A _posse_!?That's _adorable_," he said. "I just can't say no to someone with a _posse_, can I?Well, come on in, then."

Lauren should really have thanked me for making Shane let us in, but she just walked in like she owned the place, dragging Tommy with her. Whatever, it's not like I care about her 'thanks'. The important thing was that Karma tugged at my arm and made her "I'm squealing on the inside"-face at me. That look was enough to make this whole ridiculous thing seem worth it.

Hm. Maybe that (and the thousand other similar things that have happened since forever) should have made me suspect something? Yeah, whatever, no getting ahead of the story.

* * *

><p>The first thing I noticed once we got into the house was that people actually used those red plastic cups you always see in teen movies. Who knew?<p>

The _second_thing I noticed was Shane Harvey yelling "Everyone's wearing too many clothes!" though the music.

"Let's do something about that," he went on. "Strip poker!"

This was met by general cheering. I've never felt so completely out of place in my. whole. life.

People started grouping together to form a large circle. Meanwhile, I was edging sideways out of the room, dragging Karma with me. She'd noticed Liam Booker joining the circle, and didn't seem to be as desperate to avoid it as I was.

Lucky for her our escape route was blocked by none other than Shane Harvey himself.

"How about you, posse girls – wanna join?" he asked.

"No thanks," I said quickly, before Karma had time to speak.

"Aw, don't be shy," Shane replied. "You're our guests of honor! Look, we can even play something else if you like, we're probably too many for poker anyway. What about Truth or dare?"

Baring my secrets to a bunch of strangers didn't sound much more appealing than baring my skin. But I also realized there was no way I was getting out of playing _something_at this point. There were about thirty people staring attentively at me.

"Spin the bottle, perhaps?" I said in an embarrassingly small voice.

"The posse hath spoketh," Shane yelled out. "Spin the bottle it is! Does anyone have a bottle?"

* * *

><p>No, dammit, this really is so hard to write about. Look, I usually keep these diaries all story-like (because I distance myself from my feelings by turning my life into a narrative, yes, yes, I know, I have myself figured out pretty well, at least I thought I did, but I'm getting ahead of myself again and also this parenthesis is getting way too long so I'm going to stop it right here). Yeah. But this is difficult to write about in a detached way. So I'll just put it out there without twaddling. Here we go.<p>

Karma kissed me.

I think I'm in love with her.

There, I said it.

It's all a bit of a blur, but I'll try to write down what happened.

Karma spun the bottle. It pointed at me. (I think she might have some trick to get it to point at whoever she wants, that seems like a thing she'd spend hours practicing.) She came crawling over to me on all fours, and sat down in front of me,. We looked into each other's eyes. We both had to bite our lips so we wouldn't start giggling, because at this point the whole thing was just a silly thing we had to do because of the game.

But then she, like, closed her eyes and leaned in, and suddenly I couldn't look away from her. Her white dress made her look kind of like a bride. She was very beautiful. And then she kissed me.

I mean, I've kissed people before. Well, boys. It was… not like this. Meh, nothing I can think to write about it does it justice. It felt like… confetti should've rained down from the sky or something. Yeah, whatever. It was a good kiss. Let's leave it at that.

So she kissed me, and then we looked deeply into each others eyes, and I think I said "Whoa", and then she said "I know" and for that one moment everything was perfect and beautiful in the world. It was like we saw each other, really _saw _ each other, for the first time ever. But then Karma turned away from me and shot this super sultry look at… Liam Booker.

Liam. Fucking. Booker.

I wanted to scream, but obviously I couldn't, so instead I just looked away. And my eyes fell on our gracious host, Shane Harvey. He was looking from Karma to Liam, then back to Karma, and then to me. And then he stared at me with this, like, _knowing look_ (as they say).

* * *

><p>I <em>really<em>needed to be alone then, so I said I had to go to the bathroom, but instead I went out into the garden. There was a bouncing castle there. It looked kinda sad without anyone jumping in it, but I wasn't in a bouncy mood.

Instead I went over to the teal indoor sofa that someone inexplicably had dragged out into the garden. It had a big wine stain on it, but the stain was dry, so I sat down on it. I might have cried for a bit.

After a while I saw Shane Harvey come out the door with two of those red cup thingies, so I quickly blew my nose and wiped at my eyes.

Shane put the cups down at the small table in front of the sofa. It looked like it was just water in them. I couldn't deny that I was a bit touched by the gesture.

"Oh, gurl", Shane said. (I could tell from the way he said it that it's spelled with a "u".)

"What." I said, trying to feign ignorance or whatever.

"I know a gay realization when I see one," he said, confirming my fear of having been utterly transparent. "Don't worry, I won't blab to your friend. Gay scout's honor!"

He waved his crossed fingers in the air. Then he sat down beside me on the sofa and added "What was your name again?"

"Amy," I said.

"Hi Amy," he said, extending his hand in an awkward angle (because of how close we were sitting). "I'm Shane."

"I know," I said, shaking his hand.

"Do you want a hug or something?" he asked.

"Nah, not really," I said. "I react badly to touch when I'm in shock."

"Oh, gurl," he said again. "Drink some water, then."

I did.

"I saw that you were crying, by the way," he said as I drank. (I almost choked.) "And I just wanted to say that I understand. I was you once. Scared and confused and alone. Afraid of being rejected. But that campaign is right, you know. It _does_ get better."

"You think so?" I asked. I know, I'm pathetic. I just really needed some reassurance there.

"Yeah, for sure!" Shane said. "You're pretty, you're funny, you're standoffish. All the other lesbians are gonna _love_you! And maybe that friend of yours…"

"Karma."

"Really? Her name's _Karma_? Well, anyway. Maybe she likes you too. She seemed pretty into that kiss if you ask me."

He wiggled his eyebrows.

I have to admit my heart did a bit of a somersault there, but then it fell back down into my stomach.

"She seemed pretty into Liam Booker," I replied darkly.

"Well, maybe," Shane admitted. "But she might change her mind! Liam's not exactly boyfriend material, and I say that as his best friend… and even if she doesn't change her mind there are still loads of other hot girls out there!"

"Yeah," I said. "Sure."

"Oh, this is so exciting!" Shane went on. "I've always wanted a lesbian friend!"

"Er… that's… nice," I replied. It was a pretty weird thing of him to say, right? But oddly flattering too.

"So, what do you think?" he said in a brisk voice, stretching out his hand again. "I'll take you on as my gay padawan, and I'll teach you ALL I know. How about that?"

"Yeah, sure," I said, shaking his hand once more. I might even have smiled a little.

* * *

><p>Shane said he'd tell people I had to leave because I didn't feel well, and then he found me a non-drunk friend to drive me home. He's a nice kid. I like him. (Shane, that is, not the driver. Though he was nice too. Didn't speak much. I like that in a person.)<p>

Karma sent a text asking "Should I be worried about germs? ;) xoxo", but I said I just had a headache. It's true, too. This whole thing is one giant headache.

I've had crushes before, you know? I mean, obviously if you're reading my diary you _sure as hell_know that, because that means you've read the story about the lifeguard. And _that_means I have to move to Alaska in shame. This is why what I write here is strictly between you and me, my dear diary. And Karma, of course.

…oh shit. Oh god. I've never kept a secret from Karma before! I don't even know if I _can_. But I obviously can't just tell her this either. Shit, shit, shit. It's a good thing Shane seems so… supportive. I think I'd explode if I didn't have anyone to talk to about this stupid bullshit.

Anyway, what I was going to write was that I've had crushes before, but they haven't been like _this_. As soon as I think about Karma now I go warm all over. And I think I've been in love with her for a long time, I've just never realized it. And here I thought I was an intelligent person. …wait a minute, did _Lauren_ see this coming before I did!? Yikes.

So, yes. That's the latest episode in the suddenly not so boring life of Amy Raudenfeld. To recap:

I think I'm in love with Karma. And I think _she's_in love with Liam Booker.

FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK.

At least Shane seems nice.

The End.


End file.
